The healthy Brontës

The claimed Brontë photograph that was circulating on Twitter and finally given its fifteen minutes of fame in the Daily Mail is still discussed in the newspapers. John Sutherland and Ann Dinsdale, in The Guardian, are nt fooled by it:

If this is a real picture of the Brontës, then I'm Heathcliff! (...)
Emily, after years of withering away, died of TB in 1848, Anne a year later. All, in this photograph, look as healthy as three Yorkshire puds. This photograph would have had to be taken in the 1840s, when photographic portraiture was in its infancy. This trio have left, the eye suggests, their infancy some way behind them. The one on the left (with a prayer book in her hand) looks middle-aged. Exposures, for the earliest photographs, took many minutes (trees were, for that reason, favourite objects: it can get boring). (John Sutherland)

You’ve got to think, why would there be a picture of them? There’s certainly no record of them ever having had a photograph taken. Everybody wants to know what the Brontës looked like – I regularly get sent images, either portraits or photographs, of either one woman or three women, and people think that they’re the Brontës. We do what we can, but if the image has got no provenance and it’s not documented anywhere, it’s really difficult. Even if you can look at it and say, ‘well the hairstyles are absolutely right, the costume is right,’ it’s still difficult to know for sure. (Ann Disndale)

Flavorwire revisits I Capture the Castle:

The novel pays obvious homage to many a literary source, reading like a classic Austen classic marriage plot mixed with the tangled and unrequited passions of a gentler Emily Brontë. And in fact, its heroines, diarist narrator Cassandra Mortmain and her sister Rose, are self-described “Austen-Brontë girls” who argue about which beloved author is best while talking to each other  late at night. (Sarah Seltzer)

Bucks Free Press lists five books you should have in your library:

The Crucial Classic
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
First published under the pseudonym Currer Bell in 1847, Jane Eyre has been adapted for film and TV four times in the last twenty years. The book’s enduring appeal stems from the titular character as she transforms from bullied and neglected young girl to a woman confident in her own worth. Her love for the ultimate Byronic character Mr Rochester leads to heartbreak and uncertainty, with plenty of twists and turns along the way. Just when you think Jane might finally have found happiness, something disastrous happens.
Don’t let the length of the novel put you off; Jane is constantly changing and evolving as she grows into adulthood. She has no stable sense of identity, so is incessantly searching for it. It is this journey of trying to discover who you are that speaks to so many of the novel’s readers and marks it as truly ahead of its time. If you remember Jane Eyre only as one of those novels you were forced to read at school, pick it up again as an adult and you will experience something completely different. Find out why it is often included in the 100 best novels lists. A book of great detail and depth, simmering passions and barely-disguised lust, this is one not to miss out on. (Kelly Pells)

Audiophile Audition reviews the recent recording of Johannes Brahms's third piano sonata by Margaryta Golovko:

 Syncopations and rolled tenth chords do not deter Golovko in her assault on what has become a Romantic crag that Heathcliff and Catherine Linton might ascend with various rewards at the F Major culmination of their journey. (Gary Lemco)

Pure Textuality interviews the author Maggie Farrell (not to be confused with Maggie O'Farrell) who says:

But the storyline itself is a classic one – a young, vulnerable girl falls for an older man – a father-figure – with a dark, hidden secret. It’s no coincidence that Jane Eyre and Rebecca are two of my favourite ever books.

NRC (Netherlands) has a contest going on with Villette among the possible options;  Better Living through Beowulf, Becky's Barmy Book Blog and This Will Be My Blog post about Jane Eyre.